Friday, August 07, 2015

The Sounds Like Trouble Sean Ferrell Flash Fiction writing contest

Last night I had drinks with my client Sean Ferrell.

Next thing I know [and by next I mean 1am] I'm holding a stuffed parrot, stinking of sulphur and brimstone, standing outside an apartment in Park Slope holding the leash of a rather puzzled looking dog who didn't seem to know me, with no idea how I ended up there.

Which calls for a writing contest don't you think?

The usual rules apply:

1. Write a story using 100 words or fewer.

2. Use these words in the story:

scene
feral
numb
suit
wry

3. You must use the whole word, but that whole word can be part of a larger word. The letters for the
prompt must appear in consecutive order. They cannot be backwards.
Thus: scene/obscene is ok but scene/Schenectady is not

4. Post your entry in the comment column of THIS blog post.

5. One entry per person. If you need a mulligan (a do-over) erase your entry and post again. It helps to work out your entry first, then post.

5. International entries are allowed, but prizes may vary for international addresses.

6. Titles count as part of the word count (you don't need a title)

7. Under no circumstances should you tweet to me about your own entry.
Example: "Hope you like my entry about Felix Buttonweezer!"
This is grounds for disqualification.

8. It's ok to tweet about the contest generally.
Example: "I just entered the flash fiction contest on Janet's blog and I didn't even get a lousy t-shirt"

97 comments:

“Worst. Nativity scene. Ever,” said the judge. “My eyes are numb. Mary looked like a Barbie doll, Joseph was wearing a spacesuit, and what's with the animals? There were supposed to be sheep! The Adoration of the Shepherds! NOT the Adoration of the Dinosaur-herds. Your dinosaurs look feral, anyway. That's a big no from me. Amanda?”

A female voice spoke. “No, I thought they were ghastly. Better luck next time, guys. Chin up.”

Blanche played the murder scene to the hilt, releasing a mind-numbing shriek not unlike that of a feral cat in heat. The curtain closed, signaling the end of the first act. Blanche stepped offstage and came face-to-face with an effeminate young man bearing a rose in his right hand. An admirer, no doubt. Nice to know she still had a few. They walked together toward her dressing room.“Drama suits me, don’t you think?” the aging actress said with a wry smile. “Perfectly, Miss Blanche.” He slipped a garrote around her neck with expert precision. “Now take your final bow.”

I watched em fish Dongleleib’s milquetoast carcass outta Paradise lake. Man’d been floating for ten days, and looked like some tattooed beluga whale. His pants had a tear in the crotch, and his flimsy boxers too. Wasn’t a pretty sight, but corpses don’t give a fuck what they look like.

I wryly interviewed Amy at the crime scene, his numb, bangled flaming red-headed widow from Indiana. She waited tables at Waffle-House. Said he was acting feral, they argued, and he split in their Armada.

Then Agent Fanglehaus found Dongleleib’s bookmark in a suit-pocket. He totally lost his place in life.

A pink backpack, deflated and wrinkled like a suit of old skin, sags within the feral embrace of the tree's roots. Helen pokes it with her cane. Her balance shudders, her knees kiss the ground. Soil slips, reveals faded blue ink, a long ago name – Annie Lowry. The missing girl a worn tattoo on the town's memory.

Helen, numb with shock, shifts bits of branch, rocks, through her fingers like rosary beads. She murmurs the child's name, pleads mercy. She bears an obscene resemblance to a prayerful woman.

The scene was set with a jug of bourbon and a low cut blouse.An ogle-worthy arse and wry humour fed the blaze.Ownership wasn’t conditional upon capturing the feral heart.Cold and numb, his “I do” was saluted by her expanding stomach. The lawsuit gave her half.Half is never enough.

He emerged from the murky ocean and collapsed without thought. Numb with exhaustion, he tried catching his breath. He heaved air into his lungs as his dry suit continued to save his life.

He had a wry sense of humor, but to be abandoned on a buoy ten miles off shore....

Having caught his breath, civilization was straight ahead. Something was off.

The first streetlight, where was his buoy? The scene before him was from an actual horror movie. People and animal alike acted as feral creatures. Bodies, blood and glowing red eyes awaited him. "Run" he thought....

Squirrels had her ten feral cats outnumbered. Her neighbor built a fence around their garden. She’d have to follow suit.

For days she labored, burying the fence below ground so the squirrels couldn’t dig under. She swore the bushy-tailed devils made obscene gestures at her from nearby trees. Final day, fence secure. There! That will do it. Little varmints.

Next morning she entered her garden to find everything chewed. Furious, she walked the perimeter. All seemed good.

He counts out the numbers. Bow-tie awry, his new suit seems off. Snickering as he casts a glance my way. His feral smile shows gaps between his teeth. The results are obvious.

He gets to ten, starts over again. I fidget, tired but loathe to stop him, the repercussions would be disastrous at this stage of the night. Piles of blue counters, neatly stacked, begin to accumulate.

Finally, 3 red counters face 6 stacks and 4 blue counters. He sits back, obscene in his glee, pings his bow-tie on the elastic back in place.

“What made you agree to the will, Buddy? Mom made me life tenant, you got the title.” WrySalopard. What’s the hitch?

“The B&B suits you. A ten-bedroom colonial ain’t my scene. ” You can grow your pot and rot in hell. You numb waste. “To celebrate, I got Coco Pops, one box for every room.” Buddy set the cereal on the table and signed the papers.

“They’re heavy. What’s in ‘em, gold?” Jerome squeezed a box.

In my pocket. Just wait ‘till the feral suckers plummet your reviews. “Bed bugs, what do you think?”

I stumbled on stage, clutching hand to chest. I glanced to where the director barked orders like a feral dog. In mental disarray, I could not retrieve my lines.

Pushing hand to the sky; warm, moist. A collective gasp.

“Murder most foul!” I shouted inaudibly.

Silence greeted me.

Had my audience left me? Something was surely awry. The numbness grew as did the red bloom on my disheveled suit. I knew act two, scene one would be my last. I remembered the knife, the face of my killer, but could tell no one as I took my final bow.

Worse, my mind returns to human. No longer the straightforward here-and-now, the outlawry of the wild. I worry again: the past, the future, money, my job, other people... All of the petty annoyances that make the modern world such a mind-numbing gut-wrenching pain.

I'm in the trailer with the other animal-tourists. We put on our normal human clothes. We return to the cities.

“Mr. Mueller, your place is clean and the scenery beautiful, but I still must shut you down.”“Who are you?” Mueller asks the suit.“Inspector Johan Umberger, Health Department.”“And your beef?”“Well, actually, no. Beef is not the problem.”“I don’t understand.”“Rat stew?”“Proper hasenpfeffer always calls for the most local meat.”“Perhaps, but why identify the ingredients right on the menu?”“Because I’m very honest. Are you, Inspector?”“Of course.”“Do you carry a gun?”“Well, no.”

I stared at Jake, all suited and booted, and gave him a wry smile. The wrong thing to do at a funeral. But he looked so smart -- a far cry from that feral nine-year-old I remembered. He'd grown so much in the last year. More like me now, than his dumb-ass mother. He glanced at her, silent, still, serene.

A different scene last week. Hacked into a number of pieces, she had quite a different look on her face. She'd gotten what she deserved, though. I hated her. And to my delight, I'd found out Jake hated her, too.

He’d had an obscene number of lovers in college. Practically lettered in partying, chugging cheap booze, blazing weed – more than once he’d woken up on some frat house yard, tangled with strangers in bare-ass birthday suits, huddled for warmth like feral dogs.

(A) He’d thought it was the flu. For like a year.

“Shit,” he said. “You mean, actual names?”

(I) “It’s imperative.”

All their plans had gone awry. Sean got sick first. Then Jack. It all pointed back to him.

My headed pounded. My right eye was about to shoot right out of its socket. ‘This ain’t no scene. It’s a god-damn arms race’ blared from the club’s speakers, drowning out all else. Like a feral predator, I searched the floor for my mark.

I waited, staring numbly at my cell. I needed that picture. Brook Wellington, could be a girl. Hozier cried out, ‘Take Me to Church’ as my phone vibrated. The picture appeared. Shit. There Brook stood, gorgeous, wearing an expensive suit, a wry smile on her face. My migraine ended as the bullet hit the bone.

He held a yellowed envelope addressed to the girl I’d been twenty-five years earlier. Inside, two words on a single sheet of paper. MARRY ME. My legs gave way. Images flashed, replaying the scene of Tommy’s death in the sweltering Gulf heat.

In September Katie would go to State with no idea how close she’d come to never being born.

It was quite a scene; flood stage had gone by eight days ago and still it rained. A wetsuit would beat an umbrella. Cabin fever almost numbed my mind. That she nattered when nervous shook that numbness. She had been nervous since long before flood stage happened.

From the porch we watched the water rush down what had been our street. The nattering went up a couple of notches when moccasins were swept by. I affected a wry smile when she turned my way. I pointed out a gator struggling. When she turned the smile went feral and I pushed.

MERCYHe still dressed for meals in a suit that used to fit him. Speak to him, and he might look up and affect a wry smile, as though present.

What scene was playing out in his head? What reality was he living? If there was a merciful God, it was not this one. If there was a merciful God, he was numb to his surroundings and his deteriorating brain.

Was there a merciful God who loved old men, or a feral Cat who felt nothing when they suffered and died?

The sagging porch was enough to give anyone pause. It didn’t look sturdy enough to hold a soul. It was little more than shelter for the neighborhood feral cat and her litter. Hard at work in the basement, he calmed knowing she’d warn him if a stray Girl Scout, or a wry Jehovah’s Witnesses braved the rotted planks.His contemporary lab lay in sharp contrast to the porch. He was numb to the scene before him—namely, the three-piece suit made of human flesh—but would surely make a Witness question his faith, and a Girl Scout toss her cookies.

The feral suits were all bluff and bluster. My desk provided little shelter from their displays of dominance. I’d long ago grown numb to the scene. They loomed, they smirked, they tried to flirt. I gave them nothing but a wry eyebrow in return.

I called the next name on the list, “Mr. Ferrel?”

He wasted no energy on me. A real wolf knew the difference between a lowly receptionist and an executive assistant. Welcome to the pack, I thought as I led him to his interview.

She didn’t love him anymore. Numb from its wry chafe, Raline recognized this truth as her husband lumbered to the truck stop restroom.

His phone stared blankly up at her from the sticky tabletop, buzzing with the promise of secrets revealed.

Raline’s finger poised above the buttons.

Between press and revelation flooded this: years of brooding dinners; enthusiasm rejected; chauffeuring their children alone to doctors and jiujitsu. It was obvious their relationship had decayed into a scene from some black and white movie featuring bad actors who couldn’t even pretend to love one another.

The scene below blurred. It was a dozen stories down to the ground but as terrifying as teetering on the edge was, stepping back and returning to her life was worse. It made a girl wonder which decisions in the chaos of memory were the stepping stones to this exact moment.

Ann felt numb. The wind that whipped around her edged on feral, tearing at her suit as though it meant to drag her down before she was ready. Fitting. A wry smile twisted her lips as she felt the wind take hold, making her last damning decision for her.

Megalodonna thrust her sharp tail towards the surfer in his black wetsuit. She knew she had on a wry grin as the surfer looked her way, numb with fear. The scene was too perfect to imagine. She felt that familiar rush of exhilaration as she shredded his leg with knife-like teeth. She then released him, reveling in his manic shrieks, and darted off before the beach patrol got to her. She spotted her next target then, a small red haired girl bobbing in floaties and headed off to start her feral routine again.

They found Dad in his birthday suit, darting from shrub to shrub in the neighbors' yards, like a feral cat trying to escape. As usual, Emmett Hawley, the neighborhood numbskull and self-appointed muckraker, had called 911 and was causing a scene by the time I arrived with Dad's bathrobe.

"Mrs. Hawley shouldn't see such things!"

The snickering enraged Mr. Hawley. He pointed at me and shouted. "Your father should be locked up!"

"He's harmless."

"He's a menace!"

"His wiring's gone awry, that's all."

The "A" word, left unspoken, hung in the silence like a shroud as I walked Dad home.

Calamine-saturated memories of the aftermath of the Feral Cat Infestation of 1987 at the family lake house bubbled into his mind. This only amplified the incessant itching.

10 minutes until the interview. Now 5 minutes. Too late to turn back now. Shit.

The sorry scene clearly amused the receptionist, who flashed him a wry, snaggle-toothed grin when she caught him surreptitiously tugging up his trouser leg for a stealth scratch. Willing his skin numb, he let the charcoal tweed fabric tumble back down, exhaling pathetically.

They came in suits: tweeds, checks, lapel-pins, pinstripes, bowties, neckties, and little folded pockets squares, one right after the other. The same twenty lawyers performing another lousy dance number in the LoCo lockup. Phones clicked. Chairs screeched.Then she waltzed in. Lean, sheen, and hot as the summer sun, she brooked more sauce from the dozy guard than she ever did from me.“Careful, ”the man warned, jerking his chin my way. “That one’s feral.”“He doesn’t look like trouble.” She smiled wryly.“Looks are deceiving.” “Are they now?” I chuckled. My wife always was good at setting the scene.

Reggie was loathe to make a scene, but the comment from Lord Mortimer had left him numb. How dare the despot wryly infer that managerial incompetence allowed “Poison Mary” to escape Bedlam. Why it was Mortimer himself who cut funding to the institution, and insisted on unqualified, nepotistic hires. She was out there somewhere, feral in the fogged British night. Reggie’s eyes shifted over the faces at the banquet table, wondering which plutocrat would seek to capitalize on his fallen favor. Mortimer seemed gripped by sudden pallor; he stopped chewing his mutton and vomited down the front of his suit.

Amelia, whose obscene comedy had garnered great wealth, was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Numb with grief, she sought any treatment that might help her survive, no matter the cost. She found a shifty scientist doing secret tests, transfering human minds into brain-dead bodies.

When she woke after the transferal, the doctor said, "The operation went awry. The body we chose for you wasn't sufficiently brain-dead. You now share a body with a Jesuit priest."

After months of fighting, Amelia and the priest reached an agreement – comedy, yes; obscenity, no – and discovered a lucrative career in pulpits across the country.

A boat pulled into the marina, driven by a feral-looking man. As he brought it to a stop, the engine hummed, vibrating until he cut it off. It had not been his intention to take the boat out, but the scene at the house yesterday had driven him to water. All that carrying on turned him numb. Jumping onto the dock, he slung his suit jacket over one shoulder and took a look at the water, still and clear, calling him back. “You picked one hell of a day to die, Pop,” he muttered, giving the boat a wry grimace.

We embraced under the cover of the woods, scared of every twilight sound. We drew a life in words that we knew we'd never live: I'd wear a black suit and you'd wear the scene-stealing white one. Our guest list comprised people we'd only ever read. The night we were found, it went awry. They didn't do much really. They wouldn't give me back my shirt. Told me I was feral. They left you alone, out of respect for your brother. Later, at your place, the purple mark your brother stamped upon your face made you numb your heart.

Pig-tailed Lisa cracked open her piggy-eyed brother’s skull. She scuttled up his numb back and into his head. Inside the hollow cranium she saw a naked bawling baby stuck the wall by its eyes. Upon exaggerated wincing she realized the baby was a pudgy feral swine squealing obscenely. She plucked the pig from the skull and climbed out. Since the pig and her brother shared one pair of eyes, her brother’s eyeless body lay still. Lisa wore her brother’s carcass like a suit and pretended she was him. No one suspected anything was awry, except the pig, which she ate.

Shrouded in darkness, a wry smile crept over her face, her black catsuit ensuring her camouflage in the blackened alleyway. She surveyed her surroundings, pleased that the light behind the bar was out. Now, she waits, the scene set for a confrontation years overdue, her mind numbed by the rehearsals for this moment she'd had in her head, it had consumed her. It would end. Her reverie broken by the feral cat that leaped out of the trash bin, she lit her cigarette with shaking hands. missing the snick of the hammer, not hearing the bullet that shattered her skull.

Three years ago my mom didn’t care for cats. Dogs, she said, are better suited as pets.

Then the calico showed up: hungry, pathetic-looking, ready to melt the numbest heart. Mom put out Kibbles. The cat kept coming back; Kibbles turned into Whiskas. And then, one day, this scrawny, feral cat shows up with four babies. Liebe Mama my mama named her. It was over then, when she gave the first cat a name.

The house is a foreign scene now: scratching-poles, cat-trees, bell-balls. Mom smiles at pens awry on the desk, ready to search for caps under the couch.

I remember leaving the murder scene, scratching my head and asking what kind of feral beast can do that to a man. I recall imagining gruesome fantasies of crocodiles or werecreatures but, as I stand here with numb terror, staring at the body I just put five bullets into, I never would have figured I’d be face to face with a simple man in a human skin suit. I’ve stopped him for good but, by the wry smile on his now dead face, I realize he claimed one final victim because this ghoul will haunt my dreams until I die.

The duke put on a pair of white cotton gloves, then lifted the 8th-century Damascene sword out of its case. His feral smile glimmered through the gloom. His face was almost koala-like as he brushed his thumb across the fine edge.

Somewhere, a door must have opened. The candelabra sputtered as it cast a shaky penumbra on the stone floor.

There's something feral about that Tom, we clapped eyes yesterday, didn't speak, just gave him the wry look, he crossed the street. So we're avoiding each other, suits me. Jasmine doesn't notice the creep, thank god, she likes her freedom though, those nights out cause me to bite my lip numb on occasion.

What's that noise outside, I'd best check, 'Jasmine!' my god she's with that Tom, in next door's privet. He howls, his libido quelled with a kick to the testicles, what's he done to my baby? If she's with kittens, she'll miss the summer cat show scene.

Rudy hated the damascene helmet-and-bodysuit that molded his heft into zigzags and penumbras. His tochus alone needed a dowry of spandex sufficient for a two-person hammock. Chargers, #57."Omaha-blah-blah," roared the quarterback.What the hell was all this nonsense? Hike a football, get brain-cocked on each transferal. He studied aerospace engineering for this?"Back injury'd net you $5 mil," the trainer once told him. Showed Rudy how to lean left and take the hit. "Hut-HIKE-"Rudy snapped the ball, leaned left.A bit too far left.The blow caught his neck. Damascene penumbras.Game over.

There once was a Dominagent called JanetWhose scene was Flash Fiction, goddam it!She was urbanely feral and leather dress suited,Highly and wryly, sublimely thigh-booted…But all numbskulls were whipped off her planet!

Wading through motel room, primordial soup should cause any CSI to question the wisdom of their student loans. Today I numbingly trudge through humanity’s filth trail like a scout in pursuit of a geocaching badge.

A hotshot Vegas transferal has been trouncing me; clearing cases like the Blues on a mission from God.

Yesterday, he was primary on this murder scene. If I collect some overlooked trace that ID’s the suspect, I can wipe that wry smile from his face.

She was mindlessly skinning a cat in our kitchen when I walked in. It was the ringtailed feral one that hunted our neighborhood. There was tomato sauce simmering, water boiling and pasta on the counter. She was humming a Billy Joel tune, Scenes From An Italian Restaurant. She gave me a wry, helpless smile.

“Dinner in twenty minutes honey.”

Her meds stopped working again. My head went numb.

I took off my suit jacket, rolled up my sleeves, “Can I help?”

I started to cry. I slipped my arms around her waist and held her tight. The insanity was back.

I used to be Wry Wryter. Go ahead google me.See, I told you. I’m still there. Sort of.I wrote about that which suited me, until words failed.

On one December morning, a feral male took twenty-six lives, leaving all of us numb with grief and empty of understanding. In a scene from a nightmare, my daughter’s best friend heroically saved some, sadly lost others and perished in the bloody process. For those on the periphery of grief, it was incomprehensible, for the families, the pain is (still) unimaginable.

The Jesuits taught that the transferal of bodily fluids was obscene outside of marriage. He smiled wryly at the memory as the nurse cleaned up the evidence of his failing body.

He could still remember Father Thomas standing in front of the classroom. “You must stay strong, men. Remember, it will be difficult, but you must stay strong.”

A wonderful marriage resulted in three fine sons. He’d stayed strong for them. He’d stayed strong when his beloved died. Now his weaknesses outnumbered his strengths and they gathered around him. It was their turn to carry on. “Stay strong, my sons.”

“Help! My wool suit’s gone feral!” Neal yelled from above. I raced upstairs to a messy scene. Tatters of silk, strips of linen, and bits of cotton layered the bedroom floor. The suit had attacked my special wry neck pillow; the pillow had vomited its feathers in fear. I felt numb with terror. His hands bloody, Neal wrestled with the herringbone tweed. “Get scissors!” he screamed.Instead, I grabbed Neal’s hunting knife from the closet and hacked the suit into pieces. It finally went limp.“That does it!” I panted, surveying the carnage. “From now on, only polyester!”

Ingredients for a drug deal gone wrong. A murder in a dark dank corner of humanity. A night of celebration turned horribly awry. A body presided over by a mangy mutt. Simon had never been a bright bulb. His last words were, “Goin’ out for a smoke.” Weeks later it was discovered cigarettes weren’t the only thing he liked to smoke. Tragic, his bride became a widow in hours.

No matter who they were, the end was always the same. Roll or slice, sweet or sourdough. The scene of the crime never changed. They waited numbly for the void in suits of strawberry jam or peanut butter Marmite. All of them…except for him. He had always been the smartest of the bunch, nicknamed “wry-bread”, and he alone knew the escape to death’s feral munching. After they took his honey bun, he made the deal. He traded in his youth for freedom, and when the last of the mold overtook him, he welcomed the trashcan like an old friend.

Hansel imagines the scene for his little sister: Their father following their voices deeper and deeper into the winter woods. His footsteps disappearing with the spring melt. Their stepmother mother tracking the trail of raw rye they leave behind.Her face when she finds their father’s caved-in suit and the house kitten grown fat and feral feasting on their kill.

It would be such sweet revenge, Gretel agrees.

If only it wasn’t so late, if only they weren’t so cold, their hands and feet so numb.

She swallowed, loving it and hating it simultaneously. She knew the others called her 'the heifer'. Always eating.Tears flooded down her cheeks; her sighs fogging the window she'd leaned her head against. Outside, the rain was pelting down. Umbrellas were no match for the cyclonic winds. Miserable. Everything was miserable.But she refused to let herself reminisce. Never did any good, anyway. One more mouthful should do it. That would be enough arsenic then."Come on," she thought. "Now, Ryhanni. Let's do this."Death by tiramisu. It was a fitting way to go.

The screaming siren ceased its howl where the trail of bloody footprints began. Police silently appeared to rise from the sidewalk like umbrella salesmen on a rainy day. Chased by the deafening sound of his beating heart with nowhere left to turn, the fugitive threw himself over the side of a dumpster landing on a feral cat. It's comfort disturbed, the cat leaped to safety with a scolding yowl, alerting the blue suit nearby.

"Got him," the cop called out. Then peering over the side of the dumpster, he spoke through a wry grin. "That cat's my partner, ya numbskull."

“Really should enter that dadburn contest.Sitting here in my birthday suit.Mind is numb.Just can’t imagine a scene with all them words in it.Feral! Guess that’s some kind of dog, right?Wry? She must ’a been drunker then me—Misspelled rye.One more will help.I write good stuff, but them guys just don’t get it.Story of my life.”

Lily smoothed her suit and knelt at the table. Her tools were arranged neatly, in readiness. An accurate answer required conscientious attention to method. One is not obscene, a feral dog snarling and snapping at a carcass. Cut corners and the process goes awry.

She breathed deeply and evenly. Numb. She formed her question, scooped up the eight coins, shook shook shook and placed the coins systematically on the trigrams. Repeat. Repeat.

She consulted the I Ching; she trusted the book unswervingly.

The answer. Exact. Infallible.

Lily picked up her knife and turned to the tightly-bound man in the corner.

The robbery had gone awry, that much was obvious. Milken leaned against the doorframe, limp with a numbness that in his drunken state seemed more suitable to this scene than feral rage. He tried to stop himself looking.

But the blood. It would never come out of the white shag.

"Sophie," Milken moaned, deep in his throat.

Take the TV, the computer. Crack the drug safe, steal the bathroom Picasso. But to murder Sophie? His hamster? His friend?

At least she'd died fighting.

Milken pulled his Glock, racked the slide. Their blood was still wet. They couldn't have gotten far.

She walks toward me, gesturing at the little brown bag in my hand. Her face is easily forgettable, but the leopard-print pantsuit she wears makes a lasting impression.

“Blue-fronted amazon,” I boast. “Worth millions.”

“Better be.” Her words numb the hairs on my neck. “Or you’ll end up like your friend, Sean Feral – whatever, and the counterfeit Wryneck he sold me. Stuffed and gathering dust in my Flatbush Avenue attic.”

I hand it over and blink away images of my own crime scene. “No charge then.” The dog at my side begins to growl.

“Wear your sweatsuit!” they said, and I obliged: an irresistible grey number festooned with rhinestone cats.

Turns out they’d meant swimsuit, which I guess they thought worked better for our annual neighborhood pool party — but I wish they’d been clearer. And you’ll be shocked what sort of bier they wanted!

Still, despite their poor communication, I did leave my goats home (half the world’s allergic to dowry these days!), and now I’m standing on the diving board, plump, merry, and poriferal against their Pirate Party scenery, bouncing gently as I can manage. Just wait til everybody sees my cannonball!

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I'm a literary agent in NYC. I specialize in crime fiction and narrative non-fiction (history and biography.) I'll be glad to receive a query letter from you; guidelines to help you decide if I'm looking for what you write are below.
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